Questioning Our COVID-19 Assumptions!

By Neenah Payne

Americans have been told since mid-March that we are all threatened by the deadly COVID-19 epidemic. To protect us from this “unprecedented threat”, many states imposed lockdowns that shut the schools and all “non-essential” businesses. People were told to self quarantine for the “good of the community”, to wear masks, and to stay six feet apart. Many people have dutifully followed these rules in the belief that they are helping to protect themselves and others. So, it may come as quite a shock to some to have all those beliefs called into question now. However, it’s essential to get the facts right. After all, these draconian policies are all supposed to be “data driven”. So, what does the data say?

The corporate media has told us that the COVID-19 virus came from bat meat in a market in Wuhan, China. However, the article points out:

It is also a fact that the animal market in Wuhan does not sell bats. A YouTube video that has been shared on social media that shows bats being sold for meat at a market was actually filmed in Langowan, Indonesia, and not in China at all.”

One myth bites the dust!


Widget not in any sidebars

Whenever the views of people who fear the COVID-19 “epidemic” are challenged, their first question is “What about all the deaths?” They feel that questioning that data is dealing in “conspiracy theories” and is irresponsible, dangerous, and not sticking to “the facts”. However, the article says:

We are told that 37,308 people have died this year from COVID-19 through April 18, yet actually 45,522 fewer people have died this year than last year during the same period of time.

It adds:

Death rates in the United States have been going down, not up, since the beginning of the year. If you pay attention to the news, you might assume that record numbers of people are dying. The opposite is true. Not only has overall mortality for the United States been going steadily downward since January, but mortality has been substantially lower this year than last year.

The article lists the weekly mortality statistics for the United States as reported by the Centers for Disease Control for the first 15 weeks of 2019 and 2020 with a total of 865,181 for 2019 and a total of 819,659 for 2020. So – no “epidemic”! The article says:

Everything that we have been doing to address the pandemic has more to do with politics and fear than with reality. It is time to re-open society, to take off our masks, and to open our eyes to what is really happening to our world.

WSJ Article: Is The Coronavirus As Deadly As They Say?

The March 27 video “Questioning Conventional Wisdom in the COVID-19 Crisis” interviews Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, a professor of medicine at Stanford University. He is a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research and a senior fellow at both the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research and the Stanford Freeman Spogli Institute.

Dr. Bhattacharya’s March 24 Wall Street Journal article Is The Coronavirus As Deadly As They Say? questions the premise that “coronavirus would kill millions without shelter-in-place orders and quarantines.” In the article, he suggests that “there’s little evidence to confirm that premise—and projections of the death toll could plausibly be orders of magnitude too high.”

The video quotes Dr. Anthony Fauci, Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease at the National Institutes of Health who is a member of the White House Corona Task Force, as saying “The flu has a mortality rate of 0.1%. This (COVID-19) has a mortality rate of ten times that.” However, Dr. Bhattacharya says that the mortality rate for COVID-19 is 0.01.%!

The video points out that

It’s not popular right now to question conventional wisdom on sheltering in place, but Dr. Bhattacharya makes a strong case for challenging it, based in economics and science. His research used data collected from hotspots around the world and his background as a doctor, a medical researcher, and an economist.

Dr. Bhattacharya explains that there is a lot of debate in the medical community about what the correct numbers are – and we should be honest about that. The policy makers plugged the worst-case scenarios into their policies, and newspapers reported their alarming views which the public accepted as scientific fact that justified the lockdown of the society and destruction of the economy.

Dr. Bhattacharya believes COVID-19 is a deadly virus, but says that antibody testing on a representative population locally and nation-wide must be done to determine HOW deadly it is – and that test just became available a few weeks before this interview. He said he hoped that results would be available by the end of April – if everything goes right. On April 17 in The Fight against COVID-19: An Update from Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, he reported that local tests confirmed that the COVID-19 mortality rate is 0.01% — like a seasonal flu. He will soon publish the data from two larger studies – one with Major League Baseball. Other groups in the US and around the world are planning to do similar studies now.

Dr. Bhattacharya warns that the lockdown could cause a global economic collapse that could kill millions of people! He points out that in the “Great Recession” of 2008, huge numbers of people died from depression and opioid overdose – deaths of despair. He says that the rise in GDP in the 20th century pulled billions of people out of poverty and raised life expectancy everywhere. It that gets reversed, it means lots of lives will be shortened unnecessarily. So, it’s vital now to get the data and the policies right – and not to overreact in ways that destroy society.

Growing Calls To Fire and Indict Dr. Fauci

On March 26, Dr. Fauci published an article in the New England Journal of Medicine called Covid-19 – Navigating the Uncharted in which he admitted that, “the overall clinical consequences of Covid-19 may ultimately be more akin to those of a severe seasonal influenza (which has a fatality rate of approximately 0.1).” Yet, in Fauci Says Schools May Open In Fall, Dr. Fauci says that whether the schools reopen in the fall depends on the “flattening of cases”. That means schools may NOT open even in the fall! He warns that a “second wave” will require another lockdown!

On April 16, the John Birch Society sent an urgent update supporting Dr. Shiva Ayyadurai in calling for Fauci to be fired. Dr. Shiva has four doctorate degrees from MIT and holds the patent on the invention of email. He is running for the US Senate from Massachusetts. The JBS says:

Fire Fauci! Dr. Anthony Fauci should be fired. The entire premise of his so-called “solutions” is predicated on the notion of granting the government broad powers and unconstitutional controls over the lives of Americans.

The John Birch Society reports that in an open letter to President Trump, Dr. Shiva is calling for Fauci to be fired from both the White House Coronavirus Task Force and as director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Former U.S. Congressman Dr. Ron Paul also called for Fauci to be fired in the April 9, 2020 Ron Paul Liberty Report.

Fauci’s Folly? Disease Expert: Lifting Lockdowns Would “Exterminate” Coronavirus says:

As figures such as Dr. Anthony Fauci recommend months of lockdowns that threaten to exterminate much of our economy, yet another expert has weighed in essentially saying that this course offers all risk and no reward. In fact, epidemiologist Knut Wittkowski stated that lifting the lockdowns would cause the Wuhan virus to be “exterminated” in weeks.

[…]

Wittkowski maintained “that the coronavirus could be ‘exterminated’ if we permitted most people to lead normal lives and sheltered the most vulnerable parts of society until the danger had passed,” reports the College Fix.

“With all respiratory diseases, the only thing that stops the disease is herd immunity,” Wittkowski told the PPP. “About 80% of the people need to have had contact with the virus, and the majority of them won’t even have recognized that they were infected, or they had very, very mild symptoms, especially if they are children.”

[…]

“So, it’s very important to keep the schools open and kids mingling to spread the virus to get herd immunity as fast as possible…It must be emphasized that our whole policy of “locking down” the nation — which threatens to collapse our economy and, ultimately perhaps, our civilization — was based on these flawed models.

Dr. Wittkowski said that a longer lockdown guarantees a “second wave”.

Lockdown Vs. Herd Immunity

Dr. Wittkowski received his PhD in computer science from the University of Stuttgart and his ScD in Medical Biometry from the Eberhard-Karls-University Tuüingen, both in Germany. He worked for 15 years at the university with Klaus Dietz, one of the world’s leading epidemiologists. Dr. Wittkowski was the head of the Department of Biostatistics, Epidemiology, and Research Design at the Rockefeller University in New York City for 20 years. He is now CEO of ASDERA LLC, a company discovering novel treatments for complex diseases from data of genome-wide association studies.

In “Perspectives on the Pandemic | Professor Knut Wittkowski | Episode 2,” epidemiologist Knut Wittkowski explains that we are experiencing horrific consequences now of bad policy decisions. The lockdown has ravaged the economy. Lockdown has severe consequences for social life and depression will surge. Closing the schools was one of the most destructive actions the government has done. Since people can get immunity from a flu naturally, a vaccine is not necessary. Yet, Bill Gates is saying that lockdown must continue until he can force everyone to take a vaccine – one from which he will profit massively and which is a violation of the Nuremberg Code!

Professor Wittkowski explains that the best way to solve the COVID-19 crisis is with “herd immunity” – not with a lockdown or vaccines. He says that it’s very important to keep schools open so kids mingle and get herd immunity as fast as possible. Nursing homes should be closed for about four weeks. He says any respiratory disease goes for two weeks, peaks, goes for two weeks — and then is gone.  “Social distancing” to “flatten the curve” prolongs the crisis.

The reported “second wave” will be a direct consequence of “flattening the curve” with social distancing – and will be used to justify another lockdown! He says COVID-19 was nothing to be scared of because it is a flu like every other flu. If the schools and business had remained open, we would have herd immunity now and there could not be a second wave. However, social distancing is almost guaranteed to CREATE a second wave in the autumn. Herd immunity typically lasts for a couple of years.

Since viruses cannot spread outdoors in the spring, one of the best forms of containment is for people to go outdoors now. “Social distancing” — staying indoors — keeps the VIRUS healthy. Dr. Wittkowski says the Chinese had an advantage because they didn’t know what they were dealing with initially. So, before they started the lockdown, there was enough time for the virus to reach herd immunity.

Wittkowski explained that since he is not paid by the government, he can do science. He says that had the government not intervened, the epidemic would have been over. He said only 2% of all symptomatic cases would have died – a high of 10,000 people – when about 35,000 people die of the flu in the US every year. He says that testing for respiratory disease is neither necessary nor effective.

Wittkowski says that Americans are more docile than they should be. If people don’t stand up for their constitutional rights now, they will lose those freedoms forever. He says that Americans should be resisting now and holding politicians responsible for their misguided policies that have shut the schools, restaurants, other businesses, and cost Americans so much in so many ways – all for nothing.

Report: Wearing Masks Is Useless and Harmful

New York Orders Residents to Wear Masks in Public says that on April 15, New York Governor Cuomo required all New Yorkers to wear masks to protect against the spread of the COVID-19 virus. Are masks helpful – or are they harmful?

Growing debate: Should Americans wear face masks to curb the spread of Covid 19 raises the question but provides no answers. However, the Choosing Life article says about the use of face masks:

Masks do not protect the wearer. Medical masks are ineffective against viruses, and cloth masks provide breeding grounds for them. A 2015 study in the British Medical Journal found that healthcare workers caught viruses from their patients 13 times more often if they wore a cloth mask than if they wore a medical mask, and a Chinese study found that a medical mask was no more protective against viruses than wearing no mask at all.

The World Health Organization warns that wearing a medical mask “may create a false sense of security” against COVID-19 and that “no evidence is available on its usefulness to protect non-sick persons.”

The N95 respirator, recommended for medical workers, requires training to use properly and “without training, the masks could not only expose workers to the virus but also lull them into thinking they are protected,” according to doctors at the Harvard School of Public Health. In practice, even the N95 mask has been found to be ineffective in preventing the transmission of viruses. A review of six clinical studies, published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, found that medical workers caught viruses from their patients just as often when they used N95 respirators as when they used ordinary medical masks.”

Masks are harmful to the wearer. COVID-19 kills by causing severe hypoxia (low levels of oxygen in the blood). People wearing masks rebreathe some of their exhaled air, lowering the amount of oxygen they are breathing. “Wearing respirators come[s] with a host of physiological and psychological burdens. These can interfere with task performances and reduce work efficiency. These burdens can even be severe enough to cause life-threatening conditions if not ameliorated,” wrote the author of a 2016 article in the Journal of Biological Engineering. When the N95 respirator was tested in use in 2010, the “dead-space oxygen and carbon dioxide levels did not meet the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s ambient workplace standards.” So, why are we being required to wear masks?

Ventilators Can Be Harmful

The Choosing Life article adds:

Ventilators do not work and are harmful. Dr. Cameron Kyle-Sidell quit his job in the Intensive Care Unit at Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn because he was required to put his COVID-19 patients on ventilators that he felt were killing them because the air pressure was damaging their lungs. His coronavirus patients all had severe hypoxia but healthy respiratory muscles: they needed oxygen, he said, but not pressure.

“COVID-19 lung disease, as far as I can see, is not a pneumonia,” he said, but seems to be “some kind of viral-induced disease most resembling high altitude sickness… These patients are slowly being starved of oxygen … and while they look like patients absolutely on the brink of death, they do not look like patients dying of pneumonia.” Italian doctors agree: “Patients on ventilators deteriorate anyway, in an unexplained way… Most of these patients are plainly hypoxic.”

COVID-19 patients are starving for oxygen and don’t have pneumonia. British author David Icke says in the video further below that at 60 kHz, 5G sucks oxygen out of the lungs – and 5G was reportedly introduced in Wuhan, China in November 2019.

Tests Are Not Accurate

The article reports:

PCR tests are not accurate. A March 25, 2020 paper by Carver and Jones reported that it is not possible to assess the accuracy of PCR tests because “There are little public data on the false positive and false negative rates of the various RT-PCR based tests.” A false positive test means that you are diagnosed with COVID-19 when you don’t actually have it. One of the only studies to date that has attempted to estimate the frequency of false positives is Zhuang et al., “Potential false-positive rate among the ‘asymptomatic infected individuals’ in close contacts of COVID-19 patients”, Chinese Journal of Epidemiology, 2020, 41(4): 485-488 (in Chinese). They concluded that up to 80 percent of non-symptomatic people who test positive for the coronavirus may not actually have it.

Lockdowns Are Not Effective

The article highlights:

Shutdowns do not have any effect. Japan, which did not shut down until April 6 and then only with voluntary measures, has 2 COVID-19 deaths per million population. China, which shut down in December, has 3 deaths per million population. Belarus, which never shut down, has 4 per million. South Korea, which has only voluntary measures, has 5 per million. Iran, which shut down in early March, has 62 per million. Sweden, which did not shut down, has 156 per million. Switzerland, which did shut down, has 165 per million. Belgium, which did shut down, has 503 deaths per million population. Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, all close to China, have no COVID-19 deaths at all. Vietnam shut down in early February, Laos shut down in late March, and Cambodia has never shut down at all. In the U.S., South Dakota, which has not shut down at all, has four times as many cases, but fewer deaths, than neighboring Montana, which is completely locked down.

Lockdowns are not effective and they have cost the US $2 trillion and counting! Schools have been closed and many small businesses have been forced out of business. All for what?

The 5G Connection to COVID-19 Virus?

In its Choosing Life article, The 5G Space Appeal Organization says:

Many people are afraid of even asking whether 5G is playing a role in the COVID-19 disease that has shut down much of the world. It is similar to the fear that has prevented people from questioning the orders to stay home, wear masks, and keep six feet away from each other…. The measures that have been put in place, and accepted without question, are ineffective, destructive, and anti-life.

The 5G Space Appeal Organization lists some of the dangers of 5G radiation. It says:

More than 10,000 peer-reviewed scientific studies demonstrate harm to human health from RF radiation” and lists 18 harmful effects on adults. Effects in children include autism, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and asthma.

The Choosing Life article adds:

RF radiation and COVID-19 cause similar disease. In my last newsletter (“Is the Sky Really Falling?”), I noted some effects of COVID-19 that are similar to effects of radio waves. The list of effects in common.…includes headaches, dizziness, nausea, digestive problems, muscle pain, tachycardia, hypotension, cardiac arrhythmias, strokes, and seizures. As many as two-thirds of people who test positive for COVID-19 have lost their sense of smell, often without any other symptoms. Patients are presenting with mental confusion, without any respiratory symptoms at all. Patients are presenting with diarrhea, vomiting, and abdominal pain. When patients with any of these symptoms test positive for the coronavirus, their illnesses are being attributed to that virus. But these are all classic symptoms of radio wave sickness. When both the virus and RF radiation are present, the disease should be attributed to both.

And RF radiation and COVID-19 both cause hypoxia. COVID-19 impairs oxygen absorption by the blood, and RF radiation impairs oxygen use by the cells. COVID-19 would not be so severe were it not for the radiation….

It is a fact that 5G was turned on in Wuhan, China on November 1, 2019 (SourceEd.), and that the first known COVID-19 patient became ill there on November 17.

British author David Icke says in his April 6 interview about COVID-19 with London Real linked to below that the symptoms ascribed to the COVID-19 virus might have been caused by the 5G that was turned on in Wuhan shortly before the “epidemic” started. Icke points out that at 60 kHz, 5G deprives people of oxygen.

Icke shows that during this lockdown, 5G is being installed in schools and hospitals although there was massive opposition to 5G worldwide. Icke points out that during the lockdown, one million 5G antennas are being installed in the US and Elon Musk has been given permission to launch 42,000 satellites that are beaming 5G to Earth. This has been possible because the lockdown and the requirements for social distancing have prevented protests against 5G. Doctors are reporting that patients with COVID-19 are starving for oxygen and don’t have pneumonia.

David Icke Discusses Possible 5G/COVID-19 Connection

In the April 6, 2020 video interview UPDATED: Censorship of David Icke is Waking People Up!, David Icke explains that after reviewing the work of top doctors around the world,  that the labeling of COVID-19 is questionable. Starting around 50 minutes, Icke discusses the rollout of 5G technology during the lockdown. He says that without testing, the Federal Communications Commission authorized the installation of one million antenna in the US that will link to the 42,000 satellites Elon Musk has been given permission to launch to beam 5G at the Earth. Astronomers are complaining that the satellites interfere with their view of the night sky.

Icke mentions vital videos for those watching David Icke’s London Real interview available on his site. He discusses a New York doctor who objected to the use of ventilators for COVID-19 patients. He is referring to Dr. Cameron Kyle-Sidell, an emergency medicine physician at Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn, NY whose conclusions are cited in the Choosing Life article. Dr. Kyle-Sidell discovered that people identified as COVID-19 patients are actually deprived of oxygen. Interviews with him are linked to further below.

Icke refers to the book The Invisible Rainbow: A History of Electricity and Life by Arthur Firstenberg. Amazon says that the book makes “a compelling case that many environmental problems, as well as the major diseases of industrialized civilization―heart disease, diabetes, and cancer―are related to electrical pollution.”

Firstenberg is the author of Choosing Life cited in this article. He is an American activist on the subject of electromagnetic radiation and health and founded the Cellular Phone Task Force. Firstenberg’s 1997 book is called Microwaving Our Planet: The Environmental Impact of the Wireless Revolution.

Icke explains that the society we are moving into now can be called “Fascism” or “Communism”, but the best description is Technocracy. It is run by bureaucrats, scientists, engineers, etc. rather than by elected politicians answerable to the public. The Tech Giants in Silicon Valley are technocrats and are already running the world. Bill Gates now controls The World Health Organization and is pushing the vaccine agenda although he is not a doctor, was not appointed by any government, and was not elected. Icke says that Elon Musk’s grandfather was the head of the Technocratic Society in Canada!

Human Race: Get Off Your Knees!

Technocracy Rising: The Trojan Horse of Global Transformation by Patrick Wood explains how technocracy took over the world. It says the dark horse of the New World Order is not Communism, Socialism, or Fascism. It is Technocracy – and it shows how globalization is creating that technocratic New World Order now. Wood explains that the technocratic globalists “are solidly set against the concept of the nation-state and in particular, the Constitution of the United States.”

Icke points out that a major goal of the technocracy is to require a vaccine that will implant nano technology that will connect to the 5G grid and Artificial Intelligence. Humanity will become computer terminals. He discusses the central role of Bill Gates in this global agenda.

Icke explains that humanity has the power to protect itself from this threat by simply choosing to think and act independently now. If we don’t, the future of humanity is that of slaves under the absolute control of a very small minority that has no good intentions for us. Icke says this could be the turning point where humanity finally gets off its knees! He explains that the answer is to overcome our fear and our belief that we are powerless. Icke shows that we, the vast majority, have all the power we need if we just recognize that fact and act on it now.

Icke ends with a very inspiring call for humanity to overcome our fears now and reclaim our power. He points out that people have nothing to lose now by standing up because we will lose everything if we don’t. We will be slaves to the technocracy which intends to control our every thought. He says that this is a major turning point now. He calls on humanity to stop acquiescing to the illusion of power and reminds us of the story of The Wizard of Oz – who, once exposed, had no power at all.

In Are You Getting It Yet?, Icke clarifies his position on the relationship between 5G and COVID-19. He says that he is NOT saying that 5G CAUSES COVID-19 – only that people with COVID-19 have a lack of oxygen like people with high-altitude sickness. He says that 5G also undermines the immune system and poisons cells. Icke also discusses the massive Medicare financial incentive to diagnose people as having COVID-19.

Doctors Report That COVID-19 Is New Kind of Disease

NYC doctor says high ventilator settings damage coronavirus patients’ lungs reports that Dr. Cameron Kyle-Sidell resigned from the ICU after consulting with doctors at other hospitals who agreed that ventilators are damaging the lungs of COVID-19 patients. He said they need oxygen, not pressure. He moved back to the ER where he is free to use different protocols.

In a video posted Sunday, Dr. Kyle-Sidell described COVID-19 as

a disease that does not make sense to us – a disease for which our usual treatment does not work. Some are questioning whether this is a lung disease causing blood problems or a blood disease causing lung problems. I don’t know what it is, but I know that I have never seen it before. People are dying of a disease we don’t understand, the sounds of people, old and young, and yes, there are young people dying.

Kyle-Sidell also said,

“COVID-19 lung disease, as far as I can see, is not a pneumonia but seems to be some kind of viral-induced disease most resembling high altitude sickness. It is as if tens of thousands of my fellow New Yorkers are on a plane at 30,000 feet and the cabin pressure is slowly being let out,” he said in a video posted Tuesday. “These patients are slowing being starved of oxygen…and while they look like patients absolutely on the brink of death, they do not look like patients dying of pneumonia.”

The article says:

James Cai, a physician assistant who was New Jersey’s first coronavirus patient, told The Post that he agreed with Kyle-Sidell’s observations and conclusions, based on his own experience in beating the deadly disease. It makes sense why experts in China told me to use oxygen to sleep no matter what and use it whenever I needed during the day. We need all the researchers to take a very close [look at] this disease and don’t just follow the paradigm of how to treat PNA (pneumonia)/ARDS.

The article adds that Cai noted that the muscle of the lung in ARDS patient doesn’t work properly but the muscle in a COVID-19 patient works just fine. So, a ventilator is actually doing more harm to their lungs. Cai added,

It is a new disease and none of the American doctors have encountered it in their lives, not in textbooks and they are figuring things out by experience! They really need help because thousands of American’s lives are on the line!”

In the video “Do COVID-19 Vent Protocols Need A Second Look?”, Dr. Kyle-Sidell discusses his findings in treating patients identified as having COVID-19.

“Doctors Face Troubling Question: Are they Treating Coronavirus Correctly?” interviews a number of doctors who say that the coronavirus is challenging core tenets of medicine, leading some to abandon long-established ventilator protocols for certain patients. However, other doctors warn this could be dangerous. Dr. Kyle-Sidell says that he is concerned that if they continue on the path they are on that hundreds of thousands of lungs and lives could be at risk.

Dr. Luciano Gattinoni, a visiting professor at the Medical University of Gottingen, is interviewed. He is one of the world’s leading researchers on how to treat Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS). An editorial he wrote explains that after examining 150 coronavirus patients in Italy, he found two distinct groups. Type H (high) includes 20-30% who fit the ARDS profile of having stiff, heavy lungs. However, Type L (low) consists of over 50% who do not fit the ARDS profile because they have thin, compliant lungs. Type L cannot be treated as classical ARDS. So, the same protocol cannot be used for both groups. He said that ARDS treatments would probably do more harm than good for most coronavirus patients.

Tell Your Governor To End The Lockdown Now!

When you fill out the form on the Act Now! site, you will be directed to an email you can send to your governor! This is a very simple, but powerful step! Join the movement now! When the national campaign went live on April 16, the response was so big, it crashed their servers! America is standing up for its constitutional rights and freedom. Join your fellow Americans and help end this lockdown now! Share this idea with your family and friends. Let’s take this campaign viral now!

Subscribe for natural health news to your inbox. Follow Natural Blaze on YouTube, Twitter and Facebook.

Become a Natural Blaze Patron and Support Health Freedom

Become a Patron!

Get Natural Health News Delivered

Enter Email Below To Stay Informed!


Widget not in any sidebars

10 Best Books To Survive Food Shortages & Famines


Your survival library won’t be complete without these books!

Plus get top natural health news delivered daily. Stay informed about health and food freedom, holistic remedies, and preparedness.

Claim your FREE download TODAY!

Enter your email address below to get instant access!

Enter Email Below To Stay Informed!

 
Thank you for sharing. Follow us for the latest updates.
Send this to a friend